Lectures
Spring
2025
Lecture
Series
NICOLE HUGHES, Stanford
Disputed Martyrs and the End of Christian Antiquity in La Florida
Tuesday, February 25, 5:15 pm
Macksey Seminar Room 2043
Brody Learning Commons, JHU Homewood Campus
Co-sponsored by the Alexander Grass Humanities Institute
SANDRO LA BARBERA, University of Trento
Like A Virgil: Culex and the Canon
Tuesday, March 11, 5:15 pm
Macksey Seminar Room 2043
Brody Learning Commons, JHU Homewood Campus
EARLE HAVENS, Johns Hopkins University, and JENNIFER JARVIS, Johns Hopkins University
Renaissance Sundials: A Paper Tool “Making Event”
Tuesday, March 25, 5:15 pm
George Peabody Library
Attendees learn about, assemble, and take home a 17th-century paper sundial.
Co-sponsored by the Department of Conservation & Preservation, Sheridan Libraries, JHU
RICHARD KAGAN, Johns Hopkins University
Book Launch: The Inquisition’s Inquisitor: Henry Charles Lea of Philadelphia
Tuesday, April 8, 5:15 pm
Macksey Seminar Room 2043
Brody Learning Commons, JHU Homewood Campus
Co-sponsored by the KSAS Dean’s Office and the JHU Academy
MASTER CLASS
Renaissance Humanist Print Culture, Washington DC (Folger Shakespeare Library, Library of Congress, National Gallery of Art, and a private rare book collection)
Friday, May 2, all day
Co-sponsored by the Department of Classics, the Alexander Grass Humanities Institute, and the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe
Interested faculty and graduate students must RSVP to sterncenter@jhu.edu by April 14 to enroll in this Master Class.
PAST LECTURES
PAST LECTURES
Fall
2024
Lecture
Series
GERARD GONZÁLEZ GERMAIN, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Modern Books on Ancient Stones: The Development and Reception of Printed Collections of Inscriptions in the 16th Century
Tuesday, September 3, 5:15 pm
Brody Learning Commons, JHU Homewood Campus
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe, and the Department of Classics, JHU
KELSEY CHAMPAGNE, St. Mary’s College of Maryland
Keeper of the Crèche: Religion, Economics, and Material Culture in an Early Modern Tuscan Convent
Wednesday, September 25, 5:15 pm
Macksey Seminar Room 2043
Brody Learning Commons, JHU Homewood Campus
Co-sponsored by the Alexander Grass Humanities Institute, JHU
JOSÉ MONTELONGO, Brown University
In Search of the Intended Reader: Historical Reading Practices in Sixteenth-Century Mexico
Tuesday, October 15, 5:15 pm
Macksey Seminar Room 2043
Brody Learning Commons, JHU Homewood Campus
Co-sponsored by the Program in Latin American, Caribbean, and Latinx Studies, JHU
JARED HICKMAN, Johns Hopkins University
Maryland as New Ireland: The Landscape, Language, and Legacy of Charles Carroll the Settler
Tuesday, November 12, 5:15 pm
Macksey Seminar Room 2043
Brody Learning Commons, JHU Homewood Campus
Co-sponsored by the Department of English, JHU
NICHOLAS JONES, Yale University
A Provocation on the State of the Field: Cervantine Blackness
Tuesday, December 3, 5:15pm
Macksey Seminar Room 2043
Brody Learning Commons, JHU Homewood Campus
Co-sponsored by the Spanish and Portuguese Section of the Department of Modern Languages & Literatures, JHU
Spring
2024
Lecture
Series
OLIVIA WEISSER, University of Massachusetts, Boston
Shopping for Pox Cures in Early Modern London
Tuesday, March 7, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Department of the History of Medicine,
and the Center for Medical Humanities and Social Medicine, JHU
MATTEO VENIER, University of Udine
Another Side of Italian Humanistic Literature:
The 1493 Manuscript Nova de miraculis disputatio
of Petrus Haedus at JHU
Tuesday, March 26, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of
Premodern Europe, and the Italian Section of the Department of
Modern Languages & Literatures, JHU
EMILY WILSON, University of Pennsylvania
Emily Wilson on the Iliad
Wednesday, March 27, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored with the Department of Classics, JHU
Round Table Discussants:
ANN BLAIR (Harvard), ANTHONY GRAFTON (Princeton),
EARLE HAVENS (JHU), WALTER STEPHENS (JHU),
Chaired by Krieger School of Arts & Sciences Dean
CHRISTOPHER CELENZA (JHU)
Book Launch:
Walter Stephens, How Writing Made us Human, 3000 B.C. to Now
Tuesday, April 2, 5:30 pm
Co-sponsored by the Johns Hopkins University Press
JENNIFER JARVIS (JHU) and EARLE HAVENS (JHU)
The Terrestrial and Celestial Globe Gores of François Demongenet (1552) at JHU
Tuesday, April 16, 5:15pm: A Rare Book “Making” Event
Co-sponsored by the Department of Conservation and Preservation
of the Sheridan Libraries, JHU
CAROL BAXTER, Trinity College, Dublin
Networking for Success:
Early Modern Nuns and Their Support Networks
Tuesday, April 30, 5:15 pm
Fall
2023
Lecture
Series
NOEL BLANCO MOURELLE, University of Chicago
The Art of Knowing Everything.
The Afterlives of Ramon Llull
Tuesday, September 5, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Spanish Section of the Department of
Modern Languages & Literatures
PETER DAVIDSON, Campion Hall, Oxford
Robert Southwell SJ, An Early Modern Catholic Poet and his Protestant Afterlives
Tuesday, October 3, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe,
the Alexander Grass Humanities Institute, and the Department of Classics
JANE STEVENSON, Campion Hall, Oxford
Invisible Women:
Female Latinists after the Renaissance
Thursday, October 5, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe,
the Alexander Grass Humanities Institute, and the Department of Classics
JAN GRAFFIUS, Stonyhurst College
Clandestine Survivals of Medieval and Early Modern Catholic Memory in England and the Spanish Netherlands
November 7, 5:15 pm
ERIN GIFFIN, Skidmore College
Tangible Abstractions: Holy Lengths on Textile and Paper in the Catholic Cult of Loreto
November 14, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Department of the History of Art
Spring
2023
Lecture
Series
LAWRENCE PRINCIPE, History of Science & Technology, JHU
Recovering John of Rupescissa’s
Liber lucis: Medieval Alchemy, Philology,
and the Antichrist
Wednesday, March 1, 5:15 pm
Panel and “Making” Event
KAREN NÍ MHEALLAIGH, Classics, JHU
EARLE HAVENS, Stern Center, JHU
FILIP GEAMAN, History of Science & Technology, JHU
JENNIFER JARVIS, Department of Conservation & Preservation, JHU
Cosmic Visions in Early Modern Italy:
Vincenzo Coronelli’s Paper Supercomputer
Wednesday, March 15, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the 2022-23 JHU Discovery Award project “Cosmic Visions: Humanistic Engagements with the James Webb Space Telescope”
CATERINA MORDEGLIA, Literature and Philosophy, Università degli Studi di Trento
The Scribal Fortunes of Phaedrus’ Fables:
Mysterious Disappearances and Unexpected Rediscoveries of an Ancient Latin Text in the Middle Ages and Renaissance
Tuesday, March 28, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe
Fall
2022
Lecture
Series
CARME FONT, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Cloistered Iconoclasts:
Challenging Stereotypes of Early Modern Spiritual Women
Tuesday, September 27, 5:15 pm
CARME FONT, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Wisdom to be Found:
Genealogies of Knowledge in Women’s Spiritual Writings of the Long Reformation
Tuesday, October 4, 4:00 pm
STEPHEN CLARKE, University of Liverpool
‘We saw churches, palaces, and pictures from morning to night’: New Manuscript Discoveries at JHU from Thomas Gray’s and Horace Walpole’s Grand Tour
Tuesday, October 11, 5:15 pm
MAXIM RIGAUX, Ghent University
Epic Echoes in JHU’s Women of the Book Collection:
Towards a Gendered Approach to Early Modern Ibero-American Epic
Tuesday, October 18, 5:15 pm
SCOTT MANDELBROTE, Peterhouse College, Cambridge
Isaac Newton’s Lost Reading
Thursday, November 3, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe
Fall
2019
Lecture
Series
PAULA FINDLEN, Stanford University
Why Put a Museum in a Book? Ferrante Imperato’s Cabinet of Natural History in 16th-Century Naples
Thursday, September 17, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe
PAULA FINDLEN, Stanford University
Why Put a Museum in a Book?
Ferrante Imperato’s Cabinet of Natural History in 16th-Century Naples
Thursday, September 17, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe
JASON COHEN, Berea College
Illustrated Initials:
Letters and Questions of Scale in Early Printed Books
Thursday, October 8, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe
JASON COHEN, Berea College
Illustrated Initials:
Letters and Questions of Scale in Early Printed Books
Thursday, October 8, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe
SONJA DRIMMER, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Provisional Vision: Posters and Politics in Fifteenth-Century England
Thursday, October 22, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Department of the History of Art,
& the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe
SONJA DRIMMER, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Provisional Vision: Posters and Politics in Fifteenth-Century England
Thursday, October 22, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Department of the History of Art,
& the Singleton Center for the Study of Premodern Europe
SETH KIMMEL, Columbia University
Early Modern Iberia, Indexed:
Hernando Colón’s Cosmography
Wednesday, November 13, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Department of the History of Science & Technology,
and the Department of German & Romance Languages & Literatures
SETH KIMMEL, Columbia University
Early Modern Iberia, Indexed:
Hernando Colón’s Cosmography
Wednesday, November 13, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Department of the History of Science & Technology,
and the Department of German & Romance Languages & Literatures
ALISON SHELL,
University College London
English Recusant Drama in Manuscript and Print:
The Provocative Career of William Drury
Tuesday, November 19, 5:15 pm
ALISON SHELL, University College London
English Recusant Drama in Manuscript and Print:
The Provocative Career of William Drury
Tuesday, November 19, 5:15 pm
Spring
2019
Lecture
Series
LAUREN KASSELL, Cambridge University
Written in the Stars:
Digitizing an Astrological Archive
Wednesday, February 13, 5:15 pm
Co-Sponsored by the Singleton Center and English Department
See the Cambridge University Library “Casebooks” project
LAUREN KASSELL, Cambridge University
Written in the Stars:
Digitizing an Astrological Archive
Wednesday, February 13, 5:15 pm
Co-Sponsored by the Singleton Center and English Department
See the Cambridge University Library “Casebooks” project
MARK CABALL, University College Dublin
Reading Jamaica:
Patrick Browne, an Early Modern Irish Botanist and Physician in the West Indies
Monday, March 25, 5:15 pm
MARK CABALL, University College Dublin
Reading Jamaica:
Patrick Browne, an Early Modern Irish Botanist and Physician in the West Indies
Monday, March 25, 5:15 pm
HANNAH MARCUS, Harvard University
Forbidden Fruits: Books and their Censors
in Early Modern Italy
Thursday, February 28, 5:15 pm
Co-Sponsored by the Singleton Center
HANNAH MARCUS, Harvard University
Forbidden Fruits: Books and their Censors
in Early Modern Italy
Thursday, February 28, 5:15 pm
Co-Sponsored by the Singleton Center
Fifth Annual Bibliotheca Fictiva Lecture
FREDERIC CLARK, University of Southern California
The First Pagan Historian:
Dares Phrygius and the Forging of Troy from Isidore of Seville to Thomas Jefferson
Thursday, March 14, 5:15 pm
Co-Sponsored by the Singleton Center and Classics Department
Fifth Annual Bibliotheca Fictiva Lecture
FREDERIC CLARK, University of Southern California
The First Pagan Historian:
Dares Phrygius and the Forging of Troy from Isidore of Seville to Thomas Jefferson
Thursday, March 14, 5:15 pm
Co-Sponsored by the Singleton Center and Classics Department
SUREKHA DAVIES, John Carter Brown Library
Reading Nature and Culture: Richard Eden’s Marginalia in the Johns Hopkins Copy of Peter Martyr’s Decades of the New World (1533)
Wednesday, April 17, 5:15 pm
SUREKHA DAVIES, John Carter Brown Library
Reading Nature and Culture: Richard Eden’s Marginalia in the Johns Hopkins Copy of Peter Martyr’s Decades of the New World (1533)
Wednesday, April 17, 5:15 pm
Fall
2018
Lecture
Series
STEPHEN CLARKE, University of Liverpool
“The Most Delicious Places I Ever Beheld”: Italy and Architecture in
John Evelyn’s Grand Tour Diary, 1644-46
Thursday, September 13, 5:15 pm
STEPHEN CLARKE, University of Liverpool
“The Most Delicious Places I Ever Beheld”: Italy and Architecture in
John Evelyn’s Grand Tour Diary, 1644-46
Thursday, September 13, 5:15 pm
MAUDE VANHAELEN, University of Warwick
Plato in the Place of Aristotle:
The Teaching of Platonic Dialogues in 16th-century Universities
Tuesday, September 18, 5:15 pm
Co-Sponsored with the Department of German and
Romance Languages and Literatures
MAUDE VANHAELEN, University of Warwick
Plato in the Place of Aristotle: The Teaching of Platonic Dialogues in 16th-century Universities
Tuesday, September 18, 5:15 pm
Co-Sponsored with the Department of German and
Romance Languages and Literatures
HEATHER BAMFORD, George Washington University
Cultures of the Fragment: Intention, Reading, and Meaning in the Early Modern Iberian Manuscript
Thursday, October 18, 5:15 pm
HEATHER BAMFORD, George Washington University
Cultures of the Fragment: Intention, Reading, and Meaning in the Early Modern Iberian Manuscript
Thursday, October 18, 5:15 pm
GABRIELE FERRARIO, Johns Hopkins University
Alchemy in Motion: The Trilingual Tradition of an Alchemical Recipe Book
Wednesday, November 14, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Department of the History of Science and Technology
GABRIELE FERRARIO, Johns Hopkins University
Alchemy in Motion: The Trilingual Tradition of an Alchemical Recipe Book
Wednesday, November 14, 5:15 pm
Co-sponsored by the Department of the History of Science and Technology
Spring
2018
Lecture
Series
MARK RANKIN, James Madison University
Racking and Reading: Richard Topcliffe and the Book Culture of the Elizabethan Catholic Underground
Wednesday, February 21, 5:15 pm
MARK RANKIN, James Madison University
Racking and Reading: Richard Topcliffe and the Book Culture of the Elizabethan Catholic Underground
Wednesday, February 21, 5:15 pm
GAVIN SCHWARTZ-LEEPER, University of Warwick
Richard Grafton and John Stow: Plagiarism, Popular History, and the Book in 16th-Century England
Wednesday, April 4, 5:15 pm
GAVIN SCHWARTZ-LEEPER, University of Warwick
Richard Grafton and John Stow: Plagiarism, Popular History, and the Book in 16th-Century England
Wednesday, April 4, 5:15 pm
4th Annual Bibliotheca Fictiva Lecture on the History of Literary Forgery
THOMAS HENDRICKSON, Stanford University
Forgery and the Rise of the Book in Classical Antiquity
Friday, April 6, 3:00 pm
4th Annual Bibliotheca Fictiva Lecture on the History of Literary Forgery
THOMAS HENDRICKSON, Stanford University
Forgery and the Rise of the Book in Classical Antiquity
Friday, April 6, 3:00 pm
JOSHUA SMITH, Department of Classics, Johns Hopkins University
Homer’s Ocean: Concepts of Influence in Ancient Criticism
Tuesday, April 24, 5:15 pm
JOSHUA SMITH, Department of Classics, Johns Hopkins University
Homer’s Ocean: Concepts of Influence in Ancient Criticism
Tuesday, April 24, 5:15 pm